Round The Rugged Rock

Cherry

By Ewan

Tue, 20 Jun 2023
  • 707 reads
7 comments
 

Remember this pronounciation exercise, to help us all with our 'R's? At "Pwy-Mewwy" School? I changed it. I changed it into - I don't know, a good luck charm, a cantrip, whatever. No, I did. I said my version to myself every time we touched down in our 50-year-old airframe, after a hairy approach to The Rock. Every approach to The Rock seemed to be “hairy”. No landing like the last feather from a pillow-flight. More like landing in the middle of a pillow-fight. Being buffeted; seats rattling; expensive electronics straining bolts and frames. Winds could be tricky, that was The Rock’s fault, mostly. Sometimes, it was pilots showing off. Or, maybe, co-pilots. Lots of times I had my eyes shut, even if I wasn’t near one of the very few windows. 29 of us in a re-jigged Comet. Yes, that one, that stopped being an airliner because the windows kept falling out. It's name was the Nimrod R1. When I first flew on it, it was the most secret aircraft in the skies, apart from the USAF's Stealth Bombers.

In Gibraltar, in those days, the runway crossed the road. We didn’t like to say the road crossed the runway. As things slowed down in the ‘90s - in the Med, anyway, it was somewhat hairier out of Rome over the Balkans – facilities at RAF Gibraltar were in shorter supply. I only stayed on any base twice, once in the RAF Sgts’ Mess and once at HMS Rook, the Navy’s onshore presence on The Rock. The rest of the time it was faded splendour in The Rock Hotel – yes that one, that John and Yoko stayed in, the night before their wedding – or one of the few chain hotels on the island then.
                                                                                                                                         
So a trip to The Rock never started well for me. Some of them didn’t end well. I stepped in front of a man on a moped once, he was admitted to hospital and I got three stitches at the medical centre on HMS Rook. Yes, it is on, any shore base is treated exactly like an ocean-going vessel. I stepped on the grass and someone with a heavily embroidered sleeve shouted “Man Overboard!” and several other less than complimentary things in my face. So me writing “at” HMS Rook up there is no more than petty revenge, I admit it.

Then there was the time two of us got arrested. Attempting to cross the runway at night. There were no flights during the hours of darkness as I recall, although RAF Gibraltar was and still remains a 24-hour airfield. Just in case, you understand. Fat Albert often got tired on a long trip home from Cyprus or even further afield. I never thought the Hercules looked like it should be able to fly, anyway. Another retired aircraft I used to fly in. Talking freight only in that one. I digress, as usual.

My mate decided to sit down in the middle of the runway, instead of obliging the Gibraltarian police, who wished us to vacate the airstrip and take the not inconsiderable approved route around the perimeter, to the RAF Gibraltar Sgts’ Mess.

I don’t think I went back again to Gib, as we called it, after that.   

I am going back on Thursday. With some old and bold ex-rugby players, as we go to support our younger replacements still running out for the RAF Veterans, and The Vipers, who are Presidents and Vice-Presidents with four functioning limbs and a level of fitness that belies their age and ours. Not sure all is well between their ears, though.

I’ll probably say the phrase again on my EasyJet flight, as the rubber touches the tarmac,

“Round the Rugged Rock, the Ragged Rascals Drank”.     

Certificate PG
Story
In the Mouth of the Bear (prose)
Miscellaneous
Autobiography

Comments

Submitted by marandina on

A reunion,to look forward to, Ewan. Can't say that I have been to the Rock. A place with a complicated history. Enjoyed your reminiscence including Fat Albert's antics. Paul 

 

Submitted by Ewan on

Not a single Andalucian I met was particularly interested in the controversy. Most people had other things to worry about. Gibraltarians want - almost without exception - one of three things
a) things to stay the same
b) independence
c) to actually be British.

Some politicians are very keen on the independence thing, until they figure out the consequences of it.
What almost no-one says is 'I want to be Spanish'.

There is a huge economy - legal and black - on both sides of the border that relies on there being one, and on the "tax-free" status of the island.

Various governments of different colours have explored relinquishing the UK's claim on the island. It has been - and some would argue it still is - of strategic importance to both the RN and the RAF, it being the gateway to the Mediterranean. I would argue that our three arms of service are not quite big enough for Gibraltar to be as important as all that, now.
If the RAF is in The Baltic and former Soviet Republics it can't be in Gibraltar and Cyprus too. If the Navy's 2 carriers are off Taiwan and in the Black Sea... well. I suppose at least we have two to Russia's one, (in theory, HMS Prince of Wales has had a bumpy start to operations). China are fitting out a third carrier now and hope to have five by the 2030s.

Bet that's cheered you up no end!

Thanks for reading and commenting, BTW.

Author Page at the 'Zon
 

Submitted by Turlough on

I've been to Gibraltar. I went in July 1983. My sister worked in the communications bit of the WRNS and she was stationed there for about a year and a half so when I was on holiday in Morocco I flew over from Tangiers to visit her. It was an eighteen minute flight. The problem with an eighteen minute flight is that you're not allowed to unfasten your seat belt and go to the toilet but on the other hand we weren't pestered by cabin crew members pushing scratch cards (which hadn't even been invented then) or stale sandwiches. 

I didn't do any of the sight seeing stuff because everybody else on the plane was doing that and after eighteen minutes I'd had quite enough of them. We went to a pub opposite the place where John and Yoko stayed and had a nice cool pint of Theakston's and a ploughman's lunch. I could see why they had chosen Gibraltar as their venue. It was a nice day off too from the hot dusty little town where I had been staying on Morocco's Atlantic coast.

It was in fact the 12th of July; the day on which Orangemen in the North of Ireland celebrate the anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne. There were about a dozen of them staying at the camp in Morocco and had been spending the day tarting the place up with Union Jacks so that they could celebrate that night. My roots are from the other side of the Peace Line so I didn't really want to get involved but I did buy four bottles of Guinness in Gibralter to take back with me and drink in front of them in a very irritating way. The only alcohol at the campsite was really rough Moroccan wine, a bottle of which cost an arm and a leg and a camel's hump.

So my memories of the Rugged Rock are brief but happy ones. I hope your visit there on Thursday is a good one.

Turlough

Submitted by Insertponceyfre... on

I hope you have a good time Ewan, and a good landing!;

 

Submitted by Kris on

Umm..... I know the bar & swimming pool area there + around the botanical gardens... But I'm not confessing to anything like you did in a reminiscence sense.... (there could still be a security clearance issue with the mates on that that one)...blush

Smooth writing there making the encounter with the police appear a bit daring, mischievous & exciting......

I ahh... welll....... the botanical gardens are really nice there & the police know there way around there too, day & night. (very nice place)....

Anyway.... Chill it when you're there Ewan.. Smile & laughs, blast from the past, the good o'l dayz & then some, the new generation, brew it up a bit, I wish you good times for all.

Cheers Kris

BTW: Its a tax optimized zone (tax free is a bit sticky with compliance)... & Its a regulated Gray market, but full discloser..... (black is probably more for the principality bankers that still drag'n dark baggage)....

As civil as all that sounds....... the game is still the same wink

 

Submitted by Ewan on

 One of my fellow rugby-playing, beer-swilling ex-comrades in arms sent me what an experienced USAF Hercules Pilot said to him,

"The C-130 doesn’t actually fly - it just makes so much noise that it scares the ground away . . ."

Author Page at the 'Zon
 

Submitted by Kris on

Yep... thats right = noise & scaring the ground away.... The real skill there is sleeping in a C-130.... cuddled up w/ some kit & cargo vibrating on a long haul..... (just say'n from my POV)

& then there's the cowboy fly jocks that will blow the leafs off trees, land it on dirt strip, ramp opens, still in taxi, unload & their back up in like 5... (respect).... but it`ll clear you're bladder the 1st couple of times...... I'm sure you know all that........

Word up Pal... We're all doin 50 sunblock... Dont do any-thing I would do (You're a RAF gent, more class & manners)...(?)....... Just in case (if) sh*x goes down, send a message, still got some connections there.... (wont be the 1st time we had to recover 1 of the fly boyz).... smile..... devil

I'm actually envious Ewan, have fun, great time year to be there.!.... super cool reunion & crew get together venue!....

Cheers.....

Does that road still cross 27?..... its 2023...... just wondering....